#27 My Research:
National Caveats in the ISAF Operation in Afghanistan
& their Impact on Operational Effectiveness, 2002-2012
– Dr Regeena Kingsley
* This blog is a revised excerpt taken from Dr Regeena Kingsley’s original doctoral research in Defence & Strategic Studies (2014), entitled: “Fighting against Allies: An Examination of “National Caveats” within the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) Campaign in Afghanistan & their Impact on ISAF Operational Effectiveness, 2002-2012.”
My research comprises an in-depth study of the problem of restrictive national caveats within the multinational NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) operation in Afghanistan, and the impact these caveats have had on ISAF operational effectiveness over a decade of warfare from 2002-2012. It was undertaken over a period of seven years between 2008-2014 at the Centre for Defence & Security Studies (CDSS), which is partially funded by the New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF), at Massey University in New Zealand.
How is my Research Original?
This research is original for a number of reasons.
The Scope of the Research
Firstly, the research is the first of its kind to conduct a thorough investigation of the caveat impediment within the ISAF mission, over the period of a decade of operations between 2002-2012. It is an original research endeavour – never before undertaken in the academic sphere – which seeks to determine both the full extent of the caveat problem within the ISAF mission, and also the tangible effects of this caveat impediment on overall ISAF operational effectiveness.
Thus it is the first systematic academic analysis of the ways in which all of the ISAF caveats combined have impacted on international efforts to bring security and stability to Afghanistan, especially in terms of the caveat impact on effective security operations conducted by ISAF security forces, within the overriding context of the counterinsurgency-oriented campaign.
‘Wikileaks’ as a Key Primary Source of Information
Secondly, it is original in that it is one of the first research undertakings to examine the ISAF mission’s caveat dilemma using – as a primary source – official government diplomatic correspondence between the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and its various embassies and posts around the globe.
This cache of diplomatic cables was released online in installments by Wikileaks in 2010-2011, when this research was already well underway, to become part of the openly-accessible public record. The cache included thousands of articles relating to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Never before have researchers and scholars been given such unprecedented access to classified material.
With regard to caveats, in particular, the cache has been a veritable treasure-trove of detailed ISAF- and caveat-related information, which has also provided the positions taken and explanations given by national governments on caveat-imposition within the ISAF mission.
This research has consequently become buttressed by specific, official information from official American government and NATO sources.
Precise & Detailed ISAF Caveat Information
Thirdly, this research is original in that it identifies and provides important and detailed information with regard to a range of caveat-related ISAF factors within the mission, much of which has been quantified in this research in the form of tables, graphs and diagrams. Raw data has been analysed into quantitative representations which facilitate analysis and discussion of the ISAF mission’s caveat quandary.
This newly analysed information pertains to:
(1) the identities of the ISAF Troop Contribution Nations (TCNs) that have imposed caveats over the past decade;
(2) the nations within this group that have eliminated and/or re-imposed caveats over the past ten years;
(3) the total numbers of officially declared caveat numbers within the mission over this time period;
(4) the specific content of these caveats, formulated into numbered lists arranged by country and force unit type;
(5) the range of the ISAF caveats, including a complete compiled list categorised by subject-area into 21 different categories;
(6) the proportion of the entire ISAF force that has been constrained by government-imposed caveat in the conduct of their duties; and
(7) numerous tangible on-the-ground examples of caveat-induced chaos, to illustrate the way in which national caveats have impeded effective security operations (including combat operations and emergency rescue operations) within the NATO-led mission.
Caveats within a Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Multinational Operation
Fourthly, this caveat research is not only the first thorough treatment of the issue of national caveats within a multinational security operation, but also the first of its kind to take place within the context of a modern counter-insurgency (COIN) multinational campaign, rather than simply a traditional peace-keeping operation like those conducted in Africa and Eastern Europe during the 1990s. For although counter-insurgency is not the main focus or central theoretical approach of this particular research, the impact of ISAF national caveats on the prosecution of the ISAF COIN strategy has nevertheless been examined, making this research the first treatment of the connection between caveats and their corresponding effects within the context of a people-centric COIN campaign (also known as a ‘low-intensity war’).
In particular, it outlines:
(1) the ways in which national caveat imposition on ISAF security forces has debilitated the security arm of the campaign within the ISAF COIN strategy; and
(2) how the reality of constrained and anaemic security forces has in turn both directly and indirectly led to a loss of crucial support for the mission among the indigenous population of Afghanistan, in this contemporary ‘war amongst the people’.
In sum, this research examines the way in which caveats have the potential to counter true COIN. Accordingly, it may also hold important insights for the prosecution of future multinational COIN operations, which according to Kilcullen, may become increasingly necessary in future years (potentially in theatres such as Somalia, Kenya and Chechnya).[1]
Politics in War: The Relationship between Political Masters & Security Forces during Operations
Finally, from a broader perspective, this research is an important illustration of the way in which the sphere of national politics can impinge on the prosecution of effective on-the-ground security operations in the military sphere, within the overarching context of multilateral warfare. Or in other words, it is an investigation of the relationship between political masters and the security forces doing their bidding during wartime.
In his theoretical writings, Karl von Clausewitz spoke of politics as the source of all wars and conflicts, the purpose for which they are waged, and also the means of their resolution. The role of politics during wars today is not, however, limited only to their commencement, objectives and termination. Politics in fact plays an important and highly influential role during the process of warfare itself – the violent means being employed towards a political goal. Indeed, political considerations infuse the security sphere of warfare at many levels, and in a way that can have a decisive impact on the success or failure of the war campaign itself.
The political devices of national caveats are a lens through which this interplay can be investigated. This is because they consist of operational limitations and prohibitions within force contingents’ ROE, which are imposed by national governments on their national forces to control what they may legitimately do, in their respective government’s name, within the conflict they are participating in. In fact, caveats seem to be the interconnecting point at which the spheres of politics and security most demonstrably meet and intersect within any particular military theatre of war.
As discussed previously, these caveats are consequently the lynchpin between the two political and security domains, and the most tangible expression of politics on the modern battlefield (see blog ‘#16 The Practical Value of National Rules of Engagement: An Assessment’). An in-depth study of ISAF caveats, within the overriding context of an asymmetric COIN war (discussed in an upcoming blog), can consequently shed light on the role of politics in and during military operations.
Overall, the present research is original in that it is an attempt to address the academic neglect of what is a fundamental, if controversial, issue for the prosecution of effective and successful multinational security campaigns in the modern era.
Research Context: Afghanistan
The NATO-led multilateral mission in Afghanistan is the setting in which the following caveat research takes place. It is an important context in which to place this caveat analysis for a number of reasons.
The ISAF Operation in Afghanistan: An Ideal Caveat Case-Study
Firstly, as outlined above, the problem of national caveats has become a major internationally-recognised and controversial issue within this Afghan operation. As a result of this controversy – and quite against the volition of the caveat-imposing countries in Afghanistan – the subject of national caveats has been thrust into the international spotlight in an unprecedented fashion, which has exposed the issue to intense public scrutiny and debate.
In fact the issue of caveats has grown to become a major recurring theme in both official government discourse and unofficial news articles and commentary on the ISAF mission, especially as increasing numbers of negative caveat-related security incidents have unfolded on the ground within the mission. Indeed, given the wide range of caveats imposed by a majority of the governments contributing forces to the ISAF mission, it is reasonable to argue that the mission represents the most illuminating case of national caveat imposition within a multinational security mission in the history of modern multilateral warfare (1990s – present).
The Afghan mission is consequently an ideal setting in which to examine and analyse the effects of caveats on overall operational effectiveness.
The Vast Amount of Available Information for ISAF Caveat Research
Secondly, as alluded to previously, this controversy has meant that there has been a vast amount of informative material written on the matter, especially within the international news media and in official government documentation, that can be analysed in an academic capacity. This material is publicly available and easily accessible to this research – to an extent never before experienced with other ‘caveated’ MNOs. Indeed, in contrast to former decades in which the issue of caveats within a multinational mission has remained highly sensitive and ‘shrouded in mystery’, this veil of secrecy has been lifted with regard to the ISAF operation, thereby presenting an ideal opportunity to conduct in-depth caveat analysis within the Afghan multinational mission.[2]
The ISAF: A Large & Complex Multinational Operation
Thirdly, the ISAF mission in Afghanistan represents one of the largest and most complex multinational security missions to occur on the world stage to date. By 2012 the mission involved 50 TCNs, and military forces commanded by the mission have grown over the past decade from a total ISAF force of 4,000 in 2002 to a massive 132,000 personnel in 2012.
In addition to the difficulties of managing such a large military operation in terms of personnel, the mission is furthermore complex in its design and command arrangements. For instance, it is not only a mission containing multinational force contingents, but it is in essence an ad hoc voluntary ‘coalition of the willing’ under the command of a separate military alliance – NATO. Furthermore, the mission employs the most complex multi-parallel Lead Nation C² command arrangement between ISAF Headquarters and its various Regional Command sectors (previously outlined in blog ‘#6 Managing Multinational Complexity – Command and Control (C²)’. The mission is also primarily a land operation which, as also discussed in blog #6 above, is the most difficult operational environment of all. This study of caveats within the context of the ISAF mission will consequently have important implications for future MNOs, especially in relation to coalition arrangements and command design in large or complex multinational ground missions.
Lastly, the ISAF mission is not a traditional military operation, neither in the sense of conventional ‘total’ war nor that of peace-keeping. It is an asymmetric, low-intensity, COIN operation – the most complex form of war in which national-building and combat must occur side-by-side. It is an operation, moreover, that is waged against an Enemy which: (1) is not easily identifiable; (2) does not operate by codified military and international rules; (3) fights asymmetrically, including through the targeting of Afghan and international civilians by means of force, threats and terror-tactics; and (4) hides within the Afghan civilian population thereby exploiting the populace as human shields. The research will consequently also hold implications for the prosecution of low-intensity COIN campaigns.
Afghanistan & the Global War on Terror: A Vital & Historical Multinational Operation
Fourth, the campaign in Afghanistan is the most important military campaign being prosecuted by the international community at this time. The stakes are high. As the base from which the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington D.C. were launched, Afghanistan is intrinsically linked to the Global War on Terrorism, which began in 2001. The entity responsible for the attacks – the Al-Qaeda terrorist organisation – remains a key player within the Afghan insurgency. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of Al-Qaeda terrorist fighters with radical beliefs and terror agendas located in sanctuaries on the Pakistan side of the Afghanistan-Pakistan ‘Durand Line’ border, among them many international jihadists who have joined the cause from around the world. This army of terror, with global designs of establishing a Muslim empire (or ‘Caliphate’) in the modern world, stand poised on the Afghan-Pakistan border to recapture Afghanistan as a terrorist sanctuary and training base, should the ISAF mission fail. The ramifications of mission success or failure could not be higher for the international community in the global struggle against Islamist terrorism.
Securing, Stabilising & Rebuilding Afghanistan: An Historic Endeavour
Fifth, the war in Afghanistan is an important, historical endeavour in the history of Afghanistan itself as a nation.
Located at the crossroads between Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, the country has for centuries been continually invaded by foreign forces seeking to control this strategically important piece of territory. From at least the 6th century B.C., Afghanistan has been repeatedly invaded by some of the world’s most powerful civilizations, including among them the Persians, Greeks, Mauryans, White Huns, Arabs, Mongols, Indian Moghuls, the British, the Soviets and, lastly, the ISI-backed Pashtun militia created in and by Pakistan, known as ‘the Taliban’ (meaning ‘students’ from Pakistan’s radical, Islamic fundamentalist ‘Madrassah’ schools in Pakistan’s border regions neighbouring Afghanistan – see endnote).[3]
Afghan history has consequently been a long, brutal and bloody affair. To varying degrees, each of these invading powers has turned the land into a site of terror and unimaginable slaughter, while also leaving behind them in their wake a permanent mark on the area’s native peoples, cultures, beliefs and landscape.
Bucking this trend, the deployment of ISAF forces to Afghanistan is the first time in Afghan history that a foreign force has come to the country not to conquer, to steal, to dominate and to destroy – but to help, to re-build, to invest, to assist, and to secure the inhabitants of that country, in the pursuit of greater national, regional and international security and stability. Namely, international ‘security assistance’ forces drawn from around the world seek to establish and support a better, fully-represented, democratic, stable and peaceful Afghan government which – after decades of savage warfare and oppression (in both Laws of War and humane terms) at the hands of the Soviet Russians, Afghan warlords, and the Pakistan-created Taliban – aims to deliver essential political, economic and social services to its people, and security to Afghanistan, the Central Asian region and the wider world.
In short, the ISAF is an historic enterprise.
NATO: Testing Itself, Its Purpose & Its Future in Afghanistan
Finally, the ISAF multinational mission is important with regard to NATO and its future role as a global ‘peace operator’ in world security affairs.
Formed as a collective security military alliance of only 12 members in 1949, NATO is today the largest and most powerful military organisation in the world, boasting a membership of 28 nations that together represent some of the most powerful militaries in the world. NATO was initially created, in the words of the first NATO Secretary General Lord Hastings Ismay, ‘to keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down’ within the overall geo-political landscape of the Cold War.[4]
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990-1991 and the reformulation of the geo-political landscape into a unipolar balance of power centering on the United States, the most powerful nation within the international system today, NATO has sought to transform itself and its purpose to that of an operator of military peace and security missions on behalf of the international community. In the wake of the 2003 Iraq War, over which confidence in the UN was seriously undermined as an effective peace and security organisation, especially within the United States, Britain and Australia, NATO’s ability to transform itself into a more robust security mission operator has gained even more impetus and significance.
The ISAF mission in Afghanistan, over which NATO has leadership, is the most important military operation in this regard. It represents the largest NATO commitment to a peace and security endeavour in alliance history: not only have national military contingents been deployed from each of the 28 NATO allies in very high force numbers (in some cases numbering into the thousands and even the tens of thousands), but NATO has also been in command of a multinational ISAF coalition, the entire force strength of which has steadily increased over the decade to stand at over 100,000 personnel from early 2010 onwards. The ISAF mission is simultaneously one of the most complex NATO-led MNOs to date, involving as it does a COIN campaign involving elements of Reconstruction & Development (R&D) in addition to combat operations against separate and thriving Pakistan-, Iran-, and Al-Qaeda-backed insurgencies. Furthermore, the operation is the very first NATO-led mission to take place outside of NATO’s traditional Area of Operations (AO) – the Americas and Europe – thereby testing NATO’s future ambitions as a global Peace Support Operation (PSO) operator.
The success of the Afghan mission is consequently of utmost importance for the purpose and future of this collective security alliance, with significant ramifications for the international community at large in terms of future multinational security endeavours. At the same time, the Afghan mission is also a critical test of the degree of solidarity and ‘collectivity’ within the alliance today, over 60 years since NATO was first established, and of their foundational principle ‘all for one and one for all’.
National caveats are a crucial issue in this respect, given that many of the heaviest caveat-imposing nations within the ISAF are in fact principal NATO allies with strong and capable militaries. Indeed, the ISAF’s caveat dilemma is a very telling indication of the health and strength of the military alliance overall and holds important implications for the future of NATO. As Brophy & Fisera have similarly concluded:
‘Caveats are an increasingly contentious issue which is threatening not only the combat capability of NATO, but is actually threatening to “drive a wedge” between NATO nations. Some observers contend that caveats are preventing military success in Afghanistan, and, by extension, are endangering the alliance itself.’[5]
In brief, under the watchful eyes of the international community, NATO is testing itself, its purpose, and its future in Afghanistan.
Research Methodology
As outlined above, the core subject matter of this research is national caveat imposition within the NATO-led ISAF multinational security operation in Afghanistan. This research seeks to assess the impact of a wide array of national caveats, imposed by the national governments of TCNs on their respective ISAF military contingents, on the ISAF mission’s overall operational effectiveness. The following is an overview of the research approach employed in the prosecution of this caveat research.
Hypothesis & Aim
In blogs #2-18, fundamental concepts for this analysis were explored in relation to diverse ROE, including national caveats, and their impact on the effectiveness of MNOs. From this overview, three main contentions can be made with regard to multinational military operations and national caveats:
(1) firstly, that national caveats generate negative effects amongst military forces deployed to a MNO;
(2) secondly, that caveats particularly limit the effectiveness of security forces within security endeavours; and
(3) thirdly, that as a consequence of the latter, the effectiveness of an entire multinational military operation can be jeopardized by the imposition of national caveats on contingents within the Multinational Force (MNF).
In beginning an in-depth investigation into the caveat dilemma within the ISAF operation in Afghanistan, the researcher likewise contends that, as within the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR) operation, the imposition of national caveats on national contingents deployed to the ISAF will have had negative effects within the ISAF mission, especially as regards to security forces conducting security operations within the Afghan COIN campaign. Indeed, this research advances the hypothesis that national caveats within the ISAF will have impacted negatively on the effectiveness of ISAF security forces within the mission, and thereby, will have also had a detrimental impact on the effectiveness of the ISAF operation overall.
The following analysis consequently adopts a deductive approach, assessing this hypothesis by analysing the practical realities of national caveat imposition and their effects within the ISAF operation in Afghanistan over the period of ten years from 2002-2012, which represents a crucial decade in the course of the operation.
The aim of this study is to determine whether ISAF national caveat restrictions have had a significant impact on the overall operational effectiveness of the ISAF mission in Afghanistan, and if so, how.
‘Unity of Effort’ as an Analytical Lens
In pursuit of this aim, this study has adopted the analytical lens of ‘unity of effort’ as a means by which to measure the impact of national caveats on ISAF operational effectiveness. As discussed in blogs ‘#7 The Fundamental Principle of “Unity of Effort” in Multinational Operations’ and ‘#8 The “Unity of Effort Model” & Multinational Commanders – Vital for Success in Multinational Operations’, unity of effort is a fundamental military principle for attaining operational effectiveness within MNOs. The latter (operational effectiveness) can not exist without the presence of the former (unity of effort).
Unity of effort is consequently the crucial lynchpin between deployed multinational forces, on the one hand, and operational success and mission accomplishment, on the other. In this way, the level of unity in the effort expended within an international force is a key measure of operational effectiveness at any point during the prosecution of a MNO.
This analysis will adopt this lens of unity of effort as an analytical device by which to assess the impact of national caveat imposition on the effectiveness of the ISAF counter-insurgency campaign in Afghanistan between 2002-2012. That is, by determining the impact of ISAF national caveats on unity of effort among the security forces of the ISAF mission, one can also determine the overall impact of the caveats on the effectiveness of the ISAF operation as a whole over the period in question (2002-2012), while simultaneously also testing the hypothesis of this study.
Key Research Questions
There are many different avenues of enquiry which could be pursued in relation to the ISAF’s large and disconcerting caveat dilemma within the ISAF mission in Afghanistan. There is not enough scope in this doctoral research, however, to explore all of these.
Consequently, in relation to the ISAF’s caveat problem, this research focuses analysis on the questions of ‘What?’ and ‘How?’, rather than the more politically-oriented questions of ‘Why?’, the latter to be left to scholars from the fields of Political Science and International Relations. More specifically, in pursuit of the aim, this research will concentrate almost exclusively on identifying the full extent or scope of the caveat problem within the ISAF mission (what?), and determining the impact of ISAF national caveats on security forces conducting the security line of operation within the strategy (how?).
Consequently, the researcher has formulated two key research questions to guide the following investigation and analysis of the ISAF caveat issue.
The first question is:
1. ‘What is the extent of the ‘caveat problem’ within the NATO-led ISAF multinational mission in Afghanistan?’
In determining the extent of national caveat imposition within the ISAF, this question also seeks to assess the ability of ISAF security forces to act in a unified manner in their activities within Afghanistan.
The second question is:
2. ‘How have ISAF national caveats tangibly impacted on the ISAF’s prosecution of security operations within the Counter-Insurgency (COIN) mission?’
In investigating the practice of ISAF security forces over the research period, this latter research question seeks to determine the on-the-ground realities pertaining to unity of effort amongst ISAF security forces in the course of their operations.
Research Findings: Assessing the Impact of ISAF National Caveats
Finally, corresponding to the aim of this research, the findings of this study will be used to assess the overall impact of ISAF national caveats on the operational effectiveness of the ISAF multinational mission over the research period 2002-2012.
This assessment will be made using the key analytical lens of unity of effort which, as outlined above, is an essential prerequisite principal for achieving operational effectiveness within all MNOs.
In sum, the study will conclude with an assessment of: firstly, the overall impact of ISAF national caveat imposition on unity of effort among security forces within the ISAF operation; and secondly, the overall impact of ISAF national caveats on operational effectiveness within the mission between 2002-2012.
This research will be presented in a series of subsequent blogs.
* For more information on the extent and impact of national caveats on the NATO-led ISAF Operation in Afghanistan, see Dr Kingsley’s full Thesis and its accompanying volume of Appendices (including ISAF national caveat lists), which can be freely viewed and downloaded from Massey University’s official website here: http://mro.massey.ac.nz/xmlui/handle/10179/6984
Endnotes
[1] See David J. Kilcullen’s ‘Countering Global Insurgency’, Journal of Strategic Studies, vol. 28, no. 4, August 2005, pp. 597-617; ‘Counter-insurgency Redux’, Survival, vol. 48, no. 4, (Winter) 2006, pp. 111-112 and The Accidental Guerrilla – Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2009, xiii-xix, 1-346.
[2] J. Brophy & M. Fisera, ‘“National Caveats” and it’s impact on the Army of the Czech Republic’ [sic], Univerzita Obrany, 29 July 2007, http://www.vabo.cz/stranky/fisera/files/National_Caveats_Short_Version_version_V_29%20JULY.pdf, (accessed November 18, 2009).
[3] See S. Tanner, Afghanistan: A Military History from Alexander the Great to the Fall of the Taliban, Cambridge, United States, Da Capo Press, 2007, pp. 1-392.
It is a well-known fact today that successive Pakistani governments, together with its covert ISI agency, have supported the Taliban and other insurgent/terrorist groups in the years since the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001, which occurred in the wake of the Afghanistan-based “9/11” terrorist attacks by the Al-Qaeda terrorist network. What is perhaps less well known, however, is the absolutely critical and instrumental role Pakistan purposely played in 1994 in creating the Taliban in the first place, from its very infancy, nor the reasons behind such a shockingly aggressive and destructive policy carried out against its Muslim neighbour in the Central Asian region.
Since its founding in 1947, Pakistan has always had a vested interest in developments within the country on its western flank – a perceived ‘backyard’ and counterweight in its never-ending rivalry with India. Following the withdrawal of the Soviets from Afghanistan in 1989 and the establishment of a multi-ethnic, native, Rabbani-Massoud government for the country, Pakistan instead sought a Pashtun-dominated Afghan government that would not only be receptive to Pakistani influence in its domestic affairs, but which would also be active on its behalf in furthering Pakistan’s national and regional interests in the Central Asian region. The Rabbani-Massoud Afghan government was an obstacle to these specific Pakistani desires and interests in Afghanistan.
As a result, Pakistan’s covert ISI has had a long history of contact, engagement and cooperation with both the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
Pakistan played a critical role in the creation of the Taliban in the first instance, the group being largely comprised of thousands of Pakistani students from the radical, Islamist ‘Madrassah’ schools along the FATA border regions, who the ISI had deliberately recruited and dispatched over the border into Afghanistan to join Mullah Omar’s tiny band near Kandahar. Without Pakistan’s direct involvement and support, the Taliban might have remained simply one of hundreds of obscure fighting militia groups in Afghanistan. With Pakistan’s help, however, it instead became a ‘credible, ideological and fighting force’ – “The Taliban” as they are known today. From October 1994 the ISI and the Pakistani military continued to give the Taliban guidance, training, equipment and even direct military assistance during the Taliban’s subsequent conquest of Afghanistan and siege of Kabul, causing the expulsion of the legitimate Rabbani-Massoud government. This Pakistani assistance and collaboration continued during all the years of the Taliban regime from 1996-2001, including when the Taliban fought military campaigns against Massoud’s ‘Northern Alliance’ resistance force, which in 1996 had retreated into northern Afghanistan. As one analyst has stated on the matter: ‘Members of the Taliban were born in Pakistani refugee camps, educated in Pakistani madrassas, trained in Pakistan and carried Pakistan identity cards.’
Consequently, ‘the Taliban’ movement has always been in essence a de facto Pakistan militia – staffed, guided and assisted by Pakistan – while masquerading and operating under the false rubric of a ‘native’ Afghan movement. As an Afghan teacher living and working in Afghanistan’s southern Helmand Province once stated to a foreign journalist: ‘The Taliban are the slaves of foreigners. They work for their masters. They want to destroy the foundation of this country’.
The leader of the Taliban, Mullah Omar, was reportedly living under ISI protection in Quetta and then Karachi as late as 2009, a report lent further credence by the location and seeming protection of Al-Qaeda leader, Bin Laden, in the Pakistan town of Abbottabad until the time he was killed by U.S. Special Forces in May 2011.
Indeed, in terms of Al-Qaeda, the ISI-Bin Laden relationship is one that has extended back nearly four decades to the Afghan-Soviet War. During the late 1990s the ISI colluded with Osama bin Laden by reportedly facilitating his introduction to the Taliban – an introduction leading to the Taliban-Al-Qaeda alliance that led to a series of terrorist attacks around the world, not least 9/11. After this lethal alliance of Al-Qaeda terrorists with the Taliban ‘terror State’ was made, Pakistan worked to further Bin Laden’s influence in Afghanistan, and even established some of his terrorist training camps, some of which Pakistan used to train its own Pakistani militants en route to Jammu and Kashmir.
According to Maloney, following the overthrow of the Taliban regime in 2001 it was Pakistani propaganda which encouraged the Taliban to regroup and wage guerrilla war against the new embryonic Afghan interim government and its international protector, the ISAF. Official and unofficial ISI support for the Taliban insurgents has reportedly been taking place since 2002, with both active and retired operatives assuming the tribal dress and beard of Mujahideen to provide cash, weapons, and training to the militants. As Boot stated in 2006: ‘Pakistan isn’t just turning a blind eye to Taliban activity. Its Inter-Services Intelligence agency seems to be increasing the amount of training and logistical support it provides to Islamist militants’. Reports include that both the ISI and the Pakistani Army have been involved in ferrying militants back and forth to training camps in the FATA region where they receive ‘an excellent education in guerrilla warfare’ – sometimes taught by ISI agents – including in the use and calibration of GPS devices and the provision of 6-foot Sakar-20 rockets. U.S. intelligence in 2008 indicated that the ISI was providing medical aid, hospital care, intelligence and military strategy to the militants – and furthermore utilising part of America’s $10 billion Pakistan military aid package to do it. According to NATO reports, only in September 2008 did Pakistan begin to see terrorists and insurgents along the border as potential threats to the security of Pakistan itself, not just Afghanistan, leading to the Pakistan’s military’s counter-insurgent offensives in the Swat valley – but significantly not to the total cessation of its assistance to insurgents and terrorists operating in Afghanistan, which continues in various forms until this present day.
In many respects, Pakistan’s involvement in the Afghan war today – and even in the very creation of the Taliban movement in 1994 – can be described as a modern Pakistani version of the ‘Great Game’ for control over Afghanistan, once played centuries ago by both the British and Russian empires. The issue of Pakistan and its ungoverned FATA sanctuary has long been regarded as the largest external issue for the NATO-led ISAF coalition – the ‘elephant in the room’ – casting long menacing and influential shadows over Afghanistan with regard to both the Taliban movement and other anti-Government and terrorist fighting groups taking part in the Afghan insurgency.
[For more specific information on Pakistan’s fundamental role in the creation of the anti-Government, Islamic extremist, Pashtun Taliban group in 1994, in the Taliban’s military conquest of Afghanistan from 1994-1996, and in the establishment of the lethal alliance between the Taliban terror State and the Al-Qaeda terrorist network during the Taliban’s totalitarian rule from 1996-2001, see the following blog ‘#28 BACKGROUND – Afghanistan: The Land, its Diverse Ethnic Peoples & the Pashtun Taliban’.]
(C. Zissis, ‘Pakistan’s Broken Border’, Council on Foreign Relations, 29 January 2007, http://www.cfr.org/publication/12486 (accessed 26 August 2008); A. Saikal, ‘Mujahideen Islamic Rule, Taliban Extremism and US Intervention’, Modern Afghanistan: A Struggle and Survival, London: I. B. Tauris, 2004, pp. 220, 221-222, 224-225, 227; S. Tanner, Afghanistan: A Military History from Alexander the Great to the Fall of the Taliban, Cambridge, United States, Da Capo Press, 2007, pp. 280, 297; C. Allen, ‘The Coming Together/Unholy Alliance’, God’s Terrorists: the Wahhabi Cult and the Hidden Roots of Modern Jihad, London: Little, Brown, 2006, p. 291; K. Baker, War in Afghanistan: A Short History of 80 Wars & Conflicts in Afghanistan & the North-West Frontier 1839–2001, Australia, Rosenburg Publishing Pty Ltd, 2011, pp. 202-203; B.R. Rubin, Barnett R. ‘Preface to the Second Edition’. The Fragmentation of Afghanistan – State Formation and Collapse in the International System (2nd ed). New Haven, Conn: Yale University Press, 2002, pp. xx-xxi; A. Rashid, ‘The Taliban: Exporting Extremism’. Foreign Affairs 78, no. 6 (November/December) 1999, p. 27; ‘Episode 5’, ‘Ross Kemp – Back on the Frontline’, dir. Southan Morris, U.K., Television Channel Sky 1, British Sky Broadcasting (216 mins), 2011 [DVD]; E. Lake, S. Carter & B. Slavin, ‘Exclusive: Taliban chief hides in Pakistan’, 20 November 2009, The Washington Post, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/20/taliban-chief-takes-cover-in-pakistan-populace/?page=all, (accessed 3 February 2014; S. Gregory, ‘The ISI and the War on Terrorism’, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, vol. 30, no. 12, 2007, pp. 1019-1020; S. M. Maloney, ‘A Violent Impediment: The Evolution of Insurgent Operations in Kandahar Province 2003-07’, Small Wars & Insurgencies 19, no. 2, June 2008, p. 23); M. Cole. ‘Killing Ourselves in Afghanistan’, Salon.com, 10 March 2008, http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/03/10/taliban/print.html, (accessed 12 June 2010); M. Boot, ‘Get Serious About Afghanistan’, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), 4 October 2006, http://www.cfr.org/publication/11598, (accessed 4 February 2010); U.S. Mission NATO HQ (released by Wikileaks), Cable 08USNATO347, Readout: September 24 North Atlantic Council Meeting, 25 September 2008, http://cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=08USNATO347&q=afghanistan%20canberra%20caveats, (accessed 26 July 2013); U.S. Mission NATO HQ (released by Wikileaks), Cable 09USNATO30, Readout North Atlantic Council Meeting January 28, 2009, 29 January 2009, http://cablegatesearch.net/cable.php?id=09USNATO30&q=afghanistan%20canberra%20caveats, (accessed 26 July 2013).
[4] Cited in D. Reynolds, The Origins of the Cold War in Europe: International Perspectives, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1994, p. 13.
[5] Brophy and Fisera, ‘“National Caveats” and it’s impact on the Army of the Czech Republic’, op. cit.